Veritech Mecha File Notes

VERITECHS:

JAPANESE NAME:

MAIN EPISODES SEEN IN:

#37, #50 - #60

MAIN WRITTEN SOURCE MATERIAL:

This is Animation #10: The Southern Cross.

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

This is Animation #10: The Southern Cross, Robotech Art 1.

COMMENTS:

The source material for this mecha was rather limited, consisting of the name, some sketchy written remarks, and several color pictures of the mecha. Even the exact transformation sequence is uncertain, and only recently captured in an animated GIF developed by Rob. Because of the scarcity of the source material, most of the data in this file is our extrapolation.

This mecha is never seen to be used in an atmosphere in the show, though it is indeed in the shape of a helicopter. Hence, we have supposed that helicopter flight is also possible - though the lack of a tail rotor suggests that the AGACS must have counterrotating blades. This suspicion is confirmed by the text of TIA#10.

The ability of this mecha to rotate its forward blades backwards is actually seen in the show, in episode #50 ("Triumvirate"), as well as in the animation sheets.

The Californium tac-nuke missiles were a pure invention on Peter's part, as was the alternate Hammerhead launcher.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

Episode #50 seems to indicate that the AGACS was brand new - and had not been in service before then. However, episode #37 ("Dana's Story") which was composed in part from footage in episode #51 ("Clone Chamber"), clearly shows the AGACS in action even before the war begins (in episode #38). We explained this by making the AGACS in #37 a pre-production run, to work out the bugs in the vehicle before it entered full production several months later. The source material lists the AGACS as operating only with the TASC, but its helicopter mode, attested to in TIAS#10, suggested an AirCav role, so we gave it to the TC as well.

COMMENTS:

This mecha is reasonably well-described in the source material. In addition to numerous black-and-white line drawings, several color images (including cut-aways), there is some small amount of written material, listing the designation and yield of the main and auxiliary engines, the bore diameter of the beam cannon, the mass, and the dimensions. Interestingly enough, when compared to the line drawings, some of the dimensions (esp. the Battloid width) are slightly off. We have chosen to take the listed height as canonical and measure all the other dimensions from the line drawings.

The additional eight-missile launcher on the left shoulder, and the 6 MRMs under the intakes are inspired by the model kits - all of which included these features.

The two missiles that appear to be fired from the head of the Alpha in one scene in episode #61 have been introduced a 4-tube Tarantula launcher. The diameter and shape of the Tarantula missile (from the RL-6 cannon) are just right for head missiles.

Though nose cannon are seen in the closing credits of the show, we have chosen to omit these, since these cannon are never used in the actual episodes, even when their appearance would have been appropriate. We do not consider the opening and closing credits to be canonical, and - if one will pardon the pun - no canon, no cannon.

The VQ-6A Vandal mentioned in the file is our adaptation of the unpiloted mecha in Donald's hangar in episode #71 ("The Secret Route"). Information in Animec indicates this was a remote-controlled retrofit of a Legioss.

The alphanumeric designation of this plane is taken from the RPG instead of from the Mospeada source material. The VF-6A and -B were created to explain the Alpha in the Sentinels video, the -1G as a hypothetical Southern Cross version, and the -1T is Peter's invention, based on the need for a dedicated fighter-trainer version of this mecha.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

There seem to be two types of gun in the same pod for this mecha. In the Sentinels video, we hear a gatling-gun sound from the virtual Alpha while Jack Baker is in the simulator. However, in the Mospeada episodes, the Alpha's gun is no longer a rapid-fire weapon, and all three barrels usually fire simultaneously. The source material identifies this weapon as an 80mm beam gun. Our solution to this was to propose the existence of two guns in the same shell. First there is the early GU-13, inspired by the RPG's GU-XX. We chose to change the name because GU-XX, while reminiscent of the Valkyrie's GU-11, sounds like it's an experimental version (due to the X). We suggest then that later in the Sentinels' War, a new 80mm beam gun, the EP-13, was developed and issued.

The VF-6G, especially those in the Southern Cross, is an attempt to explain the presence of Alphas in such frequency on Invid-occupied Earth. We know from the Sentinels video that the Alpha predates the REF's departure, and suggest that the Southern Cross continued to use the early version of the Alpha for a half-decade after the REF left, and then retired it in favor of its own mecha well before the Southern Cross segment of the series began. We should note that McKinney independantly came upon a similar idea; Alphas are mentioned several times as being in the inventory of the Southern Cross.

In addition, though the Alphas Max Sterling and Karen Penn piloted for the test of the Beta link-up had the sensor pod on the right shoulder, the one in Jack Baker's simulator did not. I have identified the former planes as a prototype VF-6C and a modified -6B, and the one in the simulator as the VF-6A.

Explaining the differences in head types was more difficult. Making one plane a recon/wild-weasel version was based loosely on the RPG's adaptation, but the differences between the -6C and -6J demanded a more elusive explanation. The idea of a military making two versions of an expensive fighter for questions of 'style' did not seem to us to be very credible. The wider spacing of the "eyes" on the -6J was noted, and that was suggested as an attempt to improve stereoscopic vision, and it was suggested that the canard might have been added for atmospheric stability.

COMMENTS:

Very little reliable written material on this mecha exists, and most of the file is entirely our speculation, based upon a close examination of the footage. Indeed, other than the name and alphanumerical designation, we have found no hard data on this mecha other than what can be gleaned from the drawings and animation.

The RPG adaptation of this mecha is rife with errors, especially in the size and in the armament section; hence, this source was not drawn on to any great extent. What the RPG identifies as a 6 MRM rack is really a sensor pod of some sort; we have made it a battery of multi-band telescopes. What the RPG identifies as dual long-range Reflex missiles are nothing more than connection points to the Alpha's upper engines.

The inboard armament is based upon the details of the show. The three triple-barreled cannons in fighter mode are showcased in episode #76 ("Metamorphosis"). The bomb bay and forearm guns are seen in episode #83 ("Reflex Point"), and the distinct shoulder and chest missile launchers are showcased in rapid succession in episode #85 ("Symphony of Light"). The shoulder launcher is also seen in some detail in the RPG's REF Field Guide, pg 29.

The underwing ordnance was based upon a picture on the first page of the Mospeada section of the ARTMIC Bible; though not seen in the show, this capability is plausible, and we included it.

The VF-12T is Peter's invention, following the same need for a trainer that motivated the creation of the VF-6T. The VE-12 Stalker is Rob's creation, following the perceiced need for an ELINT plane for the New Generation era.

JAPANESE NAME:

MAIN ISSUES SEEN IN:

Robotech II: The Malcontent Uprisings comics #2, 3, 5, 6, 8-12

MAIN WRITTEN SOURCE MATERIAL:

None.

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

Robotech II: Malcontent Uprisings comic series.

COMMENTS:

Normally, we have stayed away from the comics for the introduction of new mecha, but this particular vehicle was too attractive to pass up. However, little data was revealed about this mecha in the comic issues, other than what is seen in the artwork.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

The weapons fit is extrapolated from the drawings in the comics. The background was designed to accommodate [Colonel] Wolff's desire to use them during the Malcontent Uprisings. Since this is a transitional mecha between the RDF Army and ASC forces, it was viewed as a first generation battlefield hovercraft. This led to the comments about the complexity and high maintenance needed for the internal mechanics. This vehicle predates the protoculture cell's apparent availability, yet was supposed to have non-protoculture reliances. This led to the development of the modular engine compartment that could use either an internal combustion engine and alternator or a protoculture energizer.

We decided to better integrate the production lines of the veritech hovertanks by making the Centaur line and the losing competing bid against the VHT-2 Spartas to be one and the same. The reason for this is the limited resources so soon after the Zentraedi holocaust would limit diversification of weapons manufacture.

MAIN WRITTEN SOURCE MATERIAL:

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

COMMENTS:

This mecha was seen only briefly, in episode #71 ("The Secret Route"), during the flashback to Lancer's arrival to Earth. The version of the mecha seen in the B-Club Special#9: ARTMIC Design Works seems to be an early sketch; the version in the back of Robotech Art 3 seems closest to the version seen in the show, though the latter possessed what appeared to be a thruster backpack.

Most data in this entry is speculation, based upon the drawings we could obtain of the mecha. New material found identified the mecha as a transformable fighter that preceded the Alpha. The appearance of the fighter mode is speculation on our parts.

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

COMMENTS:

This mecha is better described in the source material than most, though even this is extremely limited. In general, we had numerous color and black-and-white line-drawings, including two cut-aways. The basic armament fit is listed (though we have strayed from it somewhat), as well as basic performance data like top speed and engine max. RPM.

The VR-055 Devastator is Peter's invention, inspired by a picture of an upgunned mecha in the ARTMIC bible. This mecha is clearly based upon the -052 make. The weapons of the -R model are designed around the forearm weapons on this mecha, and the CVR-4 around the modified personal armor required for the pilot of it. This version of the Cyclone is never seen in the show, but is a plausible extention of the Cyclone concept.

The only difference between Stick's (Scott's) and Ray's (Rand's) mecha in the Japanese source material are the forearm weapons and the model letter. From this fact we supposed that the make number (-038, -041, -052) refer to the base cyclone, and that the model letters mentioned in the source material (-F, -H, -L, and -T) refer to the optional weapons package, mainly on the forearms. There seems to be no reason to suspect that these are not fully interchangable. In addition, Peter created the -A as an unarmed basic model, the -C model to explain Sue Graham's camera package, the -M model as a speculative field medic's kit, and the -R model to explain the weapons seen on the mecha he identified as the Devastator.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

We have preferred the Mospeada names to the RPG names, except for that of the Battler, mainly to remain as true to the source material as possible. The -052 was kept as an exception, as the name "Mospeada" would have been awkward, making too close a reference to the original Japanese show itself. Furthermore, "Mospeada" seems to refer to all three types, and not just the -052.

Furthermore, the RPG's estimates of the Cyclone's armor capacity are highly inflated - thanks to the munchkinism so common in role-playing games. We have chosen to make the armor more modest, to be both more consistent with the series, and to be more credible in general.

MAIN WRITTEN SOURCE MATERIAL:

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

COMMENTS:

Aside from its dimensions, engine RPM, and top speed, the information about these mecha is extremely sparse, limited mostly to the line-drawings in the above sources.

Three of these mecha (the Hargun, MODAT 5, and Space Hargun) are all seen in various contexts in the Robotech Movie. The Strike Garland is a design found in the back of Official Art of Megazone 23 Volume 1, and appears to be a prototype of the GR-II hover-Garland seen in Megazone 23 part 2. The Garland in my files is based on the version seen in Megazone 23 part 2, while the MODAT 5 of the files (and the movie) is the version of the Garland seen in Megazone 23 part 1.

Much of this data file was inspired by the RPG adaptation of these mecha by Chris Meadows.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

The handgun of the up-armed Strike Garland appears to be a 30mm gun with a 300 round ammo drum. A back-of-the-envelope calculation showed the ammo weight and volume to be too large to fit into that weapon, so we made it into a beam gun instead.

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

COMMENTS:

Probably because its role in Southern Cross was so brief, this mecha is very poorly described in the source material. Aside from the name, the only information about this mecha was to be found in the drawings and animation.

The alphanumeric designation of the guns on this mecha essentially follow the RPG's naming convention.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

Upon examination of episode #40 ("Volunteers"), we decided that what the RPG calls the "forward lasers" were not weapons and are instead mere vernier thrusters.

MAIN EPISODES SEEN IN:

MAIN WRITTEN SOURCE MATERIAL:

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

COMMENTS:

Aside from the pictures in the source material, little written data exists for these aircraft. Hence, our entry is largely speculative, using the Alpha entry as the point of departure for these derivative craft.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

Palladium's Role-Playing Game makes two important errors with regards to these craft. Firstly, it identifies (contrary to Sue Graham's demonstration) the aircraft without a head and with an opaque bulge where the canopy should be as the "Shadow Fighter". Secondly, it errs in its estimate of the size of the aircraft that more closely resembles the traditional Alpha, asserting that it is nearly twice the size of the Alpha.

The craft more closely resembling the Alpha is the one Sue Graham's demonstration identifies as the "Shadow Fighter". The other is identified in the source material as a pilotless drone. This is supported by several things. Firstly, the opaque bulge where the canopy would normally be, with a sensor window in the front of it, is identical to that on the unmanned fighters owned by Donald in episode #71 ("The Secret Route"). Secondly, though Sera is seen to destroy one of the craft that is unambiguously manned, Scott and Lancer only destroy this variety of craft. Thirdly, we never hear cockpit chatter from these craft. Because of this, we have adhered to the source material and made the headless craft a drone.

The craft identified in the RPG as the "Vindicator", that is - the vehicle more closely resembling the Alpha, is claimed to be a giant Alpha of sorts. This is an error. Apparently Kevin Siembeda assumed that the height of the Cyclone riders in the foreground (who were crouched over their motorcycles) was six feet, and estimated the height of the veritech vehicle in the background from that. The mistake here is obvious; the height of a rider crouched over a motorcycle is much less than six feet. Instead, we used the invariant length of the Cyclone (5 feet) to estimate the height of the Battloid. Using this method, the veritech is perfectly consistent with an Alpha somewhat in the background from the Cyclones. We have reviewed the other scenes in which this mecha appears, and contrary to what some have claimed, we find the evidence for a giant alpha variant to be ambiguous (to put it charitably). It is clear, however, that the animators never intended for a giant Alpha to exist. Hence the "Vindicator" of the RPG is merely treated as a normal-sized stealth variant of the Alpha: the "Shadow Fighter".

JAPANESE NAME:

MAIN EPISODES SEEN IN:

MAIN WRITTEN SOURCE MATERIAL:

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

This is Animation #10: Southern Cross, My Anime, June 1984 Insert.

COMMENTS:

No original data on this aircraft seems to exist, so our files are based on speculation from the animation and animation sheets. The only pictures in TIA#10 consist of models. The names come from the branch description text in TIA#10.

The RPG refers to the Sylphid as the Spectre. We adopted the RPG name of Sylphid for the TAF fighter due to the lack of a good translation of the intended Japanese name. Overall, we decided to be more consistent with the source material than RPG information.

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

COMMENTS:

Little hard data on this mecha exists. Hence, much of this file is speculative. The source material lists the name and nothing more; all other data was gleaned from the pictures of the mecha.

The addition of the space-thrusters and cockpit shroud is seen only in episode #54 ("Mind Game"). The idea of the non-functional force-field hood and details of most of the smoothbore ammunition are Pieter's invention.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

Though the RPG gives the main gun as an "ion cannon", the fire arcs like a projectile in the footage, reflecting that most (if not all) of the weapons in the original Southern Cross were projectile-based. Because of this, we have changed the main gun on the basic Hovertank to a 120mm smoothbore. However, Dana and Louie refer to it as a "laser cannon" in episode #44 ("The Trap"); hence, we supposed the existence of a beam gun variant of the tank. An article in the June? 1984 issue of The Anime indicates that the Spartas has a 220mm laser cannon, a 3x36mm laser gun and a 28mm sniper laser rifle.

COMMENTS:

This is by far the most well-described piece of hardware in the Robotech universe, and the size and detail of our entry reflects this. For example, the Valkyrie and Super Valkyrie were the only craft whose performance was well-enough described for us to calculate their delta-v, and all other mecha and ships in the glossaries are calibrated to them. Aside from the development section, relatively little data in this entry is speculation; most comes from the generous Japanese sources.

Though normally merely called the "Veritech", the Valkyrie is called by its proper name at least once in the series, in episode #7 ("Bye Bye Mars").

Some variants and accesories are not seen in Robotech, but rather in the Macross Movie (Macross: Ai Oboete Imasu Ka?). They include the VT-1 and its super version, the VE-1, the UMM-7 missile launcher, and the RöX-2A (the beam gun on the Strike Valkyrie).

The VF-1B is mentioned in This is Animation Special: Macross Plus. In episode #27 ("Force of Arms") we see what appears to be a standard VF-1A, refit with a large AWACS antenna; we have called this variant the VF-1E. The Japanese name for the VF-1E is the VEFR-1, but we found this moniker too cumbersome, and inconsistent with the normal naming scheme. The VF-1F is an invention of Peter's, for use in his fanfic The Will of Heaven. A version of the VF-1A with three lasers on the head, the extra two in mounts similar to that on the VF-1J, is seen in episode #32 ("Broken Heart"). The capacity to carry bombs is mentioned in This is Animation Special: Macross Plus. The GU-12 is based the RPG's entry, and that was probably based upon a picture of a VF-1J holding an unidentified gun in Macross: Perfect Memory.

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

In the current version of the Macross continuity, the variants of the Valkyrie seen in the movie (a fictional docudrama in the Macross universe, released around 2030) but not seen in the TV series - the new cockpits, the VT-1 and VE-1, the Strike Valkyrie, and so forth - are described as having entered service after the First Space War, and were only anachronistically included in the fictional portrayal of that war in the Macross Movie. Because of this, we decided to include these vehicles into the Robotech universe in the same fashion, as hypothetical variants of the Valkyrie whose service entries post-date the events of episode #36. There's a nine-year gap between episode #36 ("To the Stars") and the Sentinels video, so we felt that there is plenty of room for the Valkyrie to have seen the same sort of development after the war in the Robotech universe as was the case in the Macross universe.

Though the blisters on the nose are seen to fire lasers in epiodes #22 ("Battle Hymn") and #25 ("Wedding Bells"), they remain problematic. Firstly, the Japanese source material refers to these blisters as FLIR (Forward-Looking Infra-Red) sensors, and not as weapons. Secondly, these blisters are where the legs attach to the nose in Battloid mode. Because of these factors, the presence of the nose lasers can be attributed to animator error. These two episodes were among many in Macross that were "farmed out" to other studios, and this sort of episode is known for many other errors. It is likely that the animators were told to portray the head laser on the Valkyrie, but drew the beams out of the nose blisters instead. Nonetheless, as purists, we can not simply dismiss them. We have treated them as a late refit to the Valkyries on the SDF-1, as a means to reduce pressure on the limited ammunition supply of the GU-11.

MAIN WRITTEN SOURCE MATERIAL:

REFERENCE FOR ANIMATION SHEETS:

COMMENTS:

This mecha was very poorly described in the Japanese source material for a long time; the Guardian and Battloid modes did not even have pictures associated with them until the "VF-X" Sony Playstation game was released, along with the promotional books that followed it. Some hard data is given in TIAS: Macross Plus, namely with regard to the performance, engine type, and vehicle performance. Most of the rest of the information is our speculation.

This mecha is not actually seen in Robotech, though Rick Hunter is seen playing with a model of the prototype (called the VF-X-4 in Macross) in episode #36 ("To the Stars").

WHY WE DID WHAT WE DID:

After noticing that Rick is playing with a model of the prototype of a new fighter in "To the Stars", we decided to adapt the production version of this plane - first seen in "Macross Flashback: 2012" - into Robotech. Its service dates span the periods for which we have little or no animation other thanthe Sentinels video, so we do not feel that the presence of this vehicle in the Robotech universe upsets the continuity.